AIBU to think part timers should get a better deal

[Frazzledme]

I've worked part time when my kids were small but it was so s* I've gone full time now. As a job the pay tends to be crap, there are hardly any jobs to pick from and I've worked in a few teams where they could never get over that I was into my job and wanted to do well. Where I work they're quite big on inclusion and diversity but if I ever mention anything about making things better for part timers and having more flexibility it's like tumbleweeds going past. I'm ok with my hours now, but some people might want to change if they have kids etc. I'd like to use my experience to improve things for others. Is there something I'm not getting why people are so funny about it?

Also I know some people see it as a choice thing, but it's not really. If it costs more to work than not work with childcare then part time hours often make sense. No tax to pay so hourly pay goes up.

Thinking of doing an article for our group magazine to highlight how things could be better. Is this a good idea? What sort of things should I include?

Or should I just think "I'm alright jack" now I've got my cosy full time job again and people seem to like and respect me.

Also I know some people see it as a choice thing, but it's not really. If it costs more to work than not work with childcare then part time hours often make sense
It's still a choice. I worked FT when my kids were little despite being no better off than if I'd worked FT. As soon as I could claim help, I was better off and it then meant I got promoted much quicker.

I considered and still consider OT working a luxury.

I problem that I see alot is pt staff often want Fridays and/or Mondays off which leaves problems for AL for the rest of the team when there is a few part timers

I think there are challenges. And you need to acknowledge and address these. For example in industries where it takes a long time to train people and a lot of money, companies may be wary about people going part time as they want a return on their investment. If someone only does 1 or 2 days its tricky to feel like they are actually part of a team. Some jobs have continuity issues e.g. it's harder for customers when they call to find someone is not there ans have to start from scratch with someone else. All these can be overcome.

If you do an article I would point out that its women who tend to take on the burden of childcare so having a harsh stance on flexible working may be preventing women from working and making things like diversity and gender pay gap worse.

I'd point out studies that show part time workers are more efficient and loyal and tend to stay at the company longer.

I'd look at different ways of flexible working eg condensed hours, or shorter hours in he office but allowing someone to catch up on admin in their own time in evening and weekends at home etc, and what a company can do to help (including informing any men who are new parents or have caring responsibilities or have a long commute, that's it's an option for them)

I'd include something about employees who have a better work life balance being more engaged at work and getting better results.

I'd challenge people personally to change the way they think and speak about part time workers. Don't act all surprised and shocked if a man is part time. Consider how small decisions have a big impact on part time employees (eg timing of meetings). Consider what language you use - things like 'Joan's only part time'. It doesnt need the 'only'. Not to make assumptions that part time workers don't want to progress and not speak to them about a promotion that you would speak to them about if they were full time.

Part-timers cost as much to employ as a full timer.

@Cocomarine

My large company is full of well paid people at middle levels (some at very senior, but not many) in interesting jobs, with career profession - who are part time.

What do they all have in common?

They took the time to get to that level before going part time.

This. Above.

No one in my career is part time unless they are at the top or at the bottom. This does effect women mainly at the bottom and men at the top. Very few PT positions. But a senior manager can step back and do 4 days a week or someone at the bottom.

Also I know some people see it as a choice thing, but it's not really. If it costs more to work than not work with childcare then part time hours often make sense. No tax to pay so hourly pay goes up.

This doesn’t make sense to me. Many people work full time while paying for childcare and are worse off - for a while. But it pays off in the long run. That is a choice that people make.

@Lalaloveyou2020

Whatever happened to jobsharing? That was popular in the late 90s, two people took on the same role and split it. If promotions are going they should allow two people to apply as one imo to make it fairer. You'd have to pick someone good to partner up with though!

I think that's maybe why it fell out of favour - it either works really well or really badly and people had too many experiences of it working badly. We do have some people doing jobshares where I work, and in every case people know who the 'good' one is and will try and deal with them if they possibly can! It also seems to work much better if they have some overlap time, but then it costs more because you're paying for 1.1 or whatever of full-time.

I work for a very forward-thinking organisation that regularly wins awards for its family-friendly policies and is big on work-life balance.

They are hugely supportive of p/t working. I have reduced my hours from 37 to 17 (in several steps). All staff are paid according to the salary scale for the job, so p/t workers get the same hourly rate as their f/t colleagues.

The only time it causes problems are when there is manadatory training, and a full day's training becomes a big chunk out of your working week and leaves you struggling to catch up.

I work in the not-for-profit sector, and know that many other 3rd sector organisations are equally flexible.

I worked for a charity in a team of six. We had a fabulous range of degrees and post grad degrees. We were there doing great things, achieving great outcomes. The work was important but did not need our higher level skills or knowledge and we could have been contributing so much more to the economy but we had all looked for part-time roles in our various sectors and not found them.

I agree with a PP who said you really need to be in a f/t role and ask to go p/t. P/t roles with seniority just don't seem to be advertised.

Job sharing can also be tricky if an established person enters one and their new job share partner just gets treated like the office temp rather than a person with the same role.

My experience of PT work couldn’t be more different.
When D.C. were little I was mainly a SAHM but once in a while I had to take part time jobs to make ends meet. In the end I had 4 pt jobs spread over 15 years. They were incredible. At the very least I earned money, had adult company and flexible hours. One job in a supermarket was very much my being a small cog in a big machine with no possibility of advancement but in all the others, once I had been there a few months and proved myself, I was given additional training, extra responsibility and more money. In two of them I had to keep turning down offers to go FT.

Another part timer said management regarded us as part time/part brain. Sums it up.

Who is the audience for the magazine? If it is meant as an internal communications publication then anything that criticises management won’t go down well. However if management do support flexible working but are not great at understanding how it works in practice then a piece with positive experiences of some who work part time, peppered with a few “I find x challenging” bits could work well.
A 900 word appeal for better treatment will not land well I don’t think.

There is part time work and part time work. If people are solely looking for 10-2 then they will struggle. I’ve seen posts on here where posters have point blank refused to consider any childcare at all. From what I’ve seen, dropping to 4 days is still ok for many senior and professional roles. I’ve done 3 days and I think it was better for my children but bad for work.

I worked for a charity in a team of six. We had a fabulous range of degrees and post grad degrees. We were there doing great things, achieving great outcomes. The work was important but did not need our higher level skills or knowledge and we could have been contributing so much more to the economy but we had all looked for part-time roles in our various sectors and not found them.

And I'm going to make a wild guess that you were all women? I was involved a little while ago in recruitment to an admin job in Higher Ed that was really badly paid and the work very unchallenging (I didn't have any control over either of these things!) but which was part-time and the person could structure the time as they liked and we had so many applicants, all women and so overqualified - lots with PhDs. To be honest I did find it depressing.

DH and I both work four days a week and he certainly got more raised eyebrows about it than me - he's the only male teacher in his school that isn't FT - but he hasn't found it detrimental; he went for quite a big responsibility, that came with quite a bit of extra money, and got it. But again, I don't think he would have if he worked any fewer days a week, it feels like more than one day not there is the 'tipping point'.

Where I work there's always talk of being diverse inclusive etc too but when it comes to flexible working they are so anti. I pointed out the policies in place around flexible working could be negatively effecting a lot of women and that we are loosing talent with such restrictive policies. Their answer is 'everyone is entitled to make a flexible working request', the reality is if you can't do 3 days in the office 9.30-5.30 you won't be able to return to work after maternity. We've discussed staggered work times, say 10am starts, but apparently this would make meetings too difficult . One excuse after the other to push women out of work. But of course our 'Gender Stats' have been sqewed to make it seem like we are paying and promoting women fairly, the reality is very different.

And also 100% agree with CheetasOnFajitas if your article was a bit moany that is never going to be ok for a corporate newsletter. They are much more likely to want the shiney positive examples.

I work in research, in a team of six. Of those, three are part time and one more works condensed hours. In the organisation overall there is a substantial number of people working part time at all levels. Homeworking for part of the week is also permitted once probation is completed.

@Ratatcat

There is part time work and part time work. If people are solely looking for 10-2 then they will struggle. I’ve seen posts on here where posters have point blank refused to consider any childcare at all. From what I’ve seen, dropping to 4 days is still ok for many senior and professional roles. I’ve done 3 days and I think it was better for my children but bad for work.

This is why I always think it's so dangerous when people on MN tell women they can just worry about their careers when their kids are all in school, there's plenty of time then. In my experience very few women who have been at home for 5+ years then want to work FT and have their kids in wraparound every day - if you didn't feel able to leave them as a toddler, you're not suddenly going to want them in childcare 8-6 as a four year old - and building rather than maintaining a career on school hours working is incredibly challenging.

I have a team of 20 and 4 are part time.

Quite a senior team of really experienced people, all 4 are excellent.

Although they are part time with fixed hours they try to be flexible when they can. If they spot a period of high holidays in the team they offer to move shifts around, if they can.
Because of this I'm really flexible with them, if I can help them out, particularly as we're working from home indefinitely, I will do.

Hour for hour, they probably are more "productive " than the hours they are paid for.

And I’ve noticed a difference in attitude towards men requesting flexible working to do drop-offs etc (not part-time though). My husband has had recruiters falling over themselves to say how wonderful it is that he’s setting an example to his team, ‘oh we just love positive male role models’ blah blah He’s director level though so can set his terms. Funnily enough I suspect an entry level woman wouldn’t have the same positive reaction.

I think the culture around PT work is all wrong.

People should be allowed to work part time if they want to and can still do their job effectively. So many people seem opposed to it purely on principle, or think it's only for new mums.

I do agree with the PP though who said 4 days is doable but less is tricky. You have to either be flexible and use some of your non working days to pick bits of work up and answer calls, or you need really firm boundaries and ways to ensure you not being there isn't a barrier to other people getting their work done.

I have worked PT for years - less than 4 days a week - however and got two promotions, not insignificant pay rise and a new job in that time. So it is doable. I do feel like my career has stalled a bit recently, but frankly I'm not as driven as I was and there isn't a natural progression route at my current employers'.

My DH also works part time.

We could be better off to the tune of 15-20k if we both worked full time, but we are happier working part time and have a great work life balance, and have enough to get by financially.

I'd like us both to stay part time until the kids are much older.

In terms of your article why not reframe it as "8 benefits of flexible / part time working" or something with a really positive spin?

Then take the best bits from your article and make it work in there.

Make it short, snappy and positive, 900 words is looooong.

I was part time but SE for over 10 years, not really a career but not bad earnings (if erratic). When Covid hit I got a good pt position for 20 hours and could have progressed but was headhunted for a better position which is 25 hours a week with a very good salary and definitely progression

What is the motivation behind writing your article, OP, because reading the initial post it seems reasonable(ish) but reading some of your later comments you seem to be mostly moaning that... well I'm not entirely sure.

My experience of part-time working is that of my mum back in the 70s (school hours, good pay because she had a very good trade) and the part-timers i championed to be allowed to work part time post maternity leave in a company i worked for. Mixed experience there.

One reduced to 6 hours a day - 8 until 2 and she came in 10 minutes before her start time, got her PC up and running, collected her coffee and worked like a trojan until time to go. (accounts team and she did manage, through begging and cajoling her in-laws to babysit) to work extra hours for month end closing.

One reduced to 4 hours a day, rolled in 2 minutes before she was due to start, got coffee, started her PC and chatted her way through her 4 hours, working ok but not really pushing it, and moaned constantly that the first one was promoted but she wasn't, that she didn't earn enough that she never had time to shop and to me (her team leader) that it was ok for me since my kids were big and i could go out in the evening to work events etc etc (no mention that i had worked 40-50 hours and more a week the entire time since my oldest was 3). She flatly refused to change her hours a bit for month end closing (despite her husband having said that he would be available for the children). She was also constantly off with a sick child (3 small ones, it's understandable but she NEVER EVER thanked us for picking up all her slack all the time)

So it's swings and roundabouts and requires the employees and the employer to have clear expectations of how it will work. (TBH this also needs to be done for full-timers but it is a slightly different issue there, i think)

General consensus seems to be that part-time workers can be very efficient and effective and that it can be a benefit to everyone involved. But it requires effort and some companies and some employees aren't prepared to put that in.

Also my experience: my friends who got a way up the career ladder and then went part-time are more satisfied than those who didn't.